The MMORPG for League of Legends has received a reboot some time ago. This was reported today, March 20, by Marc Merrill, the head of Riot Games. Obviously, the reboot of the MMORPG is connected to the departure of the game’s head, Greg Street, in March 2023. Riot Games has now stated this regarding the new direction.
This is the situation:
- The MMORPG for League of Legends, which still has no name to this day, was introduced by Riot Games in December 2020.
- The head and big name behind the game was Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street, who was once an important person at Blizzard and held the reins during the golden era of WoW.
- But in March 2023 Ghostcrawler left Riot Games and the MMORPG. Apparently, there were issues with the ability to work from home. Ghostcrawler wanted to be with family after hardships. He is now working on the new MMORPG Ghost.
Today, March 20, after a long silence, there are news about the LoL MMORPG, and while they may be expressed in a hopeful manner, they could still be concerning for fans.
Development of the LoL MMORPG starts fresh under new leadership
These are the news: The founder and head of Riot Games, Marc “Tryndamere” Merrill, writes (via twitter):
After a long time, they decided to restart the direction of the project. The decision was difficult for Riot Games, but they made it some time ago.
The original version of the MMORPG did not differ enough from what can already be played.
“We don’t believe that you all want an MMO that you’ve already played, just with a Runeterra twist: To truly do justice to the potential of Runeterra and to meet the extremely high expectations of players worldwide, we need to create something that feels like a significant evolution of the genre.
This is a big challenge, but one that our team of passionate MMO players and experienced game developers will approach with great motivation.”
When exactly did the reset occur? The job descriptions on Linkedin suggest that the realignment occurred in January 2024.
WoW guy leaves, Mass Effect guy comes
This is changing: It isn’t quite clear. However, Tryndamere is spotlighting a new developer, Fabrice Condominas, who spent 6 years at BioWare and worked as a producer on Mass Effect 3 and Mass Effect: Andromeda.
He takes over from Vijay Thakkar, who laid the technical foundations for the LoL MMORPG in 2023 and will now continue as Technical Director, while Condominas will apparently become the Game Director.
Fabrice Condominas started at Riot Games in Singapore in 2021 and has been the Executive Producer for the MMO since January 2024.
LoL MMORPG will be silent for “several years” now
These are the bad news: The bad news is that with the “restart” of the production, there will be an even longer wait for information.
Tryndamere says they will likely be “silent for several years” and will be developing in the dark.
Restart likely relates to the loss of Ghostcrawler
This is behind it: Essentially, this is now the “consequence” of losing Ghostcrawler. Riot Games is starting again from scratch and trying once more. It would probably be pointless to implement the vision of a man who is no longer in the company. And his idea of an MMORPG was already so new, and Riot Games has revealed so little about it that they can now start fresh under a new leader.
It is also true that Riot Games was hit hard by the COVID crisis, during which not much happened anyway, and the studio had to restructure. Reports and statements from the company indicate that many developers at Riot Games reoriented themselves during the COVID crisis, left the industry, and Riot Games had to seek new developers to keep the important projects (that is, the MOBA League of Legends) running.
For players, not much is actually changing. Instead of “first info in 2026”, one can now expect “first info on the LoL MMORPG” perhaps in 2028.
As early as March 2023, it became apparent that something might have been off with the LoL MMORPG:
The head of the new MMORPG for LoL is gone – a fan sees hints that the game could now be “on ice”
